McEntee Assails Shameless NLRB Decision to Deprive Millions of Workers of Union Rights

Today's three decisions announced by the National Labor Relations Board irreparably change the landscape of the American workplace by giving private-sector employers a license to deprive millions of workers of their freedom to form a union.

In Oakwood Healthcare, Inc., the lead case, the Board set forth a new standard for determining supervisors. This new standard expands the universe for workers who will now be considered supervisors depriving them of any rights under the National Labor Relations Act. Although two decisions found that the workers were employees, not supervisors, the Board's new standard will make it easier to exclude workers, especially professional employees, from the Act's protections.

This shameless decision is a cheap, semantic trick by the NLRB, which we now know stands for the National League of Republican Businessmen. Clearly, the Bush administration and its cronies will stop at nothing to turn back the clock on America’s workers until they are the modern-day equivalent of serfs in a feudal society with no rights and no respect.

The American labor movement has built its reputation on improving the lives of countless workers and will not silently stand by and let the NLRB hand over workers’ rights to opportunistic employers without a fight. We can’t afford two more years of wrong choices.

Expect workers to participate in the November elections like never before by mobilizing to take back America in 2006. We're going to elect U.S. Senators who will insist that nominees to the NLRB be fair and impartial and ultimately get this decision reversed.

AFSCME’s 1.6 million members provide the vital services that make America happen. With members in hundreds of different occupations – from nurses to corrections officers, child care providers to sanitation workers – AFSCME advocates for fairness in the workplace, excellence in public services and prosperity and opportunity for all working families.

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American Federation of State, County
and Municipal Employees, AFL-CIO
1625 L Street, N.W. Washington, D.C. 20036-5687
Telephone (202) 429-1145
Fax (202) 429-1120

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